Accounting Leadership Series 2024-2025
The Accounting Leadership Series engages all business students to hear about career experiences that have shaped our industry executives’ views on leadership. The series offers students an opportunity to hear from executives who are SCU alums.
The 2024-2025 Accounting Leadership Series program is hosted by Dr. Michael Calegari, Associate Professor of the SCU Accounting Department and the Director of the Center for Accounting Research and Education (CARE).
On October 23, 2024, the Accounting Leadership Series event featured speaker Mike Rasic, SCU '88, CFO of DealMaker. 166 students attended the event in the Daly Science 207 classroom.
Mike has a strong foundation in finance, beginning his career with an 18-year run in the audit practice at PwC, where he reached the level of partner. After leaving PwC, he took on leadership roles as CFO of a nationwide mortgage company and as Senior Vice President of Finance at CoreLogic, a Fortune 500 company.
For the past 13 years, Mike has been deeply involved in the FinTech industry, holding senior roles at five individual start-ups. Among his notable accomplishments, Mike raised close to $1.0 billion in debt and equity funding for these firms. He is currently the CFO of DealMaker, a Canadian start-up focused on making online capital raising mainstream.
On November 13, 2024, the Accounting Leadership Series event will feature speaker Stephanie Shingai, SCU ’01, Director of Corporate Reporting at Apple. 149 students attended the presentation in the Daly Science 207 classroom.
Stephanie Shingai is the Director of Corporate Reporting at Apple Inc. and oversees a team of six who are responsible for Corporate Consolidations and External Reporting. After graduating with an accounting degree from SCU, she joined Ernst & Young LLP, where she earned her California CPA license. After three years as an auditor, Stephanie transitioned to industry, where she has over 20 years of progressive experience in Financial Reporting roles and responsibilities. She worked for PG&E Corporation and SIRF Technologies prior to joining Apple in '07. Stephanie lives in San Jose, with her husband, Jeff and their Shiba Inu, Ari.
On February 5, 2025, the Accounting Leadership Series will feature speaker Juho Parkkinen, SCU '09, Chief Financial Officer at the Burning Man Project. The event will be held in the Locatelli Center. Please register to attend.
After graduating in 2009, Juho began his career at Ernst & Young, where he worked until 2016 as a Senior Manager. He was part of EY's flagship accounts such as Apple and Zynga. He then joined MongoDB, and was part of the team that took Mongo public. He was promoted up to Assistant Controller during a period of growth for the company. In 2021, Juho transitioned to C3.ai, where he eventually was promoted to the role of Chief Financial Officer. Most recently, in 2024, he joined the Burning Man Project as CFO, bringing his extensive financial leadership experience to the non-profit world.
On February 26, 2025, the Accounting Leadership Series with Sandy Mendoza, SCU '02, Senior Director at Google, will be held in the Locatelli Center. Please register to attend.
Sandy is a Senior Director in the Finance organization at Google where she leads the Controllership team for Devices & Services, which includes first party hardware (including Pixel phones and Google Nest devices) as well as various strategic services including Nest Aware, Fitbit Premium and Google Fi. Sandy is a member of the Google Finance DEI Council, and leads the DEI working team for her broader organization.
Sandy joined Google in 2011 and prior to that spent over 8 years at PricewaterhouseCoopers in their external audit practice focused on clients in the Technology and Entertainment industries. She graduated from Santa Clara University with a Bachelor of Science in Commerce with a major in Accounting through the Leavey School of Business.
On May 7, 2025, the Accounting Leadership Series event will feature speaker Steve Almassy, SCU '77, retired EY partner. The event will be held in the Lucas 126 Forbes conference room. Please register to attend.
During Steve's almost 40-year career he had numerous roles starting in the audit practice serving many of Silicon Valley’s major companies from startups to large multinationals. In his early years Steve was fortunate to serve a fledgling tech company called Apple Computer and was on the team that took the company public. Aside from being the lead partner on many of the firm’s largest tech companies he also was the firm’s first leader of its electronics industry (precursor to technology) and led the firm’s global technology, communications and media and entertainment industries.
For a number of years, Steve published a printed edition on the future of the electronics/technology industry which was hailed as a must read for those serving companies in the industry. In conjunction with the publication he yearly attended the major industry expo Comdex in Las Vegas and interviewed industry executives which interviews were broadcast nationally on CBS radio.
Steve also served on the firm’s U.S. governance board of partners as well as the global partners council, a group of partners who lead the firm’s various practices around the globe. In 2008 he moved to London to be Global Vice Chair - Industry and was responsible for helping guide the firm’s 150 largest accounts. He also was involved in the development of the firm’s global strategic plans.
In addition to his firm roles, he has served on the SCU Accounting Advisory Board and still serves on the Leavey School of Business Advisory Board. He currently serves on the board of First Tee Silicon Valley. Steve’s spouse Mary (‘77) and sons Scott (‘05) and Mark (‘08) are all proud Broncos.
If you or others you know are SCU Accounting or A&IS alumni and are interested in participating as a guest speaker, please contact accounting@scu.edu.